Friday, October 07, 2011

A Grandma by Any Other Name

I'm not sure why I started thinking about this. Maybe it was when Tucker, the 15-year-old, started talking about getting a P tattooed on his shoulder in honor of his great-grandmother Pauline, and I choked on my coffee. But I started wondering about names that kids call their grandparents. The grandparents I knew were Nana and Granddad. Because my mom's parents died, I don't even know what the 25 other grandkids called them before I came along.My parents decided to avoid the grandma and grandpa tradition. My dad became Gran and my mom became Nena. I'm not sure if Nena is an offshoot of Nana, but it works.Then my dad's sister became Nonni. I have no idea where that came from. Earl's sister has a grandbaby who will be two this week, and she calls her grandparents Memaw and Pop. I don't think I'd want to be Memaw.Hopefully, this is a question I will, personally, not have to deal with for a long time, but what weird grandparent names have you heard of? What did you call your grandparents?

8 comments:

My Grandmother was Nanny & now I am a Nanny too! I think that was a really sweet gesture on the part of your son, to want a tattoo to honor his grandmother. Maybe not what you want to hear first thing in the morning, but a sweet thought all the same.

Sally, Nanny sounds cute, but only works if you have no hired help, right?Lucia, Is that Italian? My aunt is nowhere near Italian .Grace, Mame, like the movie Mame? Or is it Mammy, like in Gone With the Wind?